Cutting Through Trump’s Lies

Mona Charen: “The January 6 committee has not conducted hearings, in the traditional sense, so much as a multi-part documentary. Wise choice.”

“The purpose is to educate the American people and to cement in the public memory the infamy of Trump’s final days. They have succeeded magnificently. Every member of the committee has conveyed a sense of righteous outrage – whether because her family were refugees from communism like Stephanie Murphy, or because they personally put their lives on the line serving in the military, like Adam Kinzinger and Elaine Luria, or because they come from a tradition of service like Liz Cheney, or because they hail from a community that was enslaved and oppressed and fought for dignity like Bennie Thompson. These are Americans who represent what is best about the country – its freedom, its openness to immigrants, its repudiation of its racist past, and its commitment to the Constitution.”

“The effects of the committee’s work may not be evident in the short term (though there are some indications that the hearings have weakened Trump’s grip on the GOP), but they will be felt in the medium and long term as the import of what happened ripens in the national consciousness.”